A Lawyer's Qualifications
No one but duly admitted members of the bar may practice law. A lawyer is trained to prepare legal documents for clients, to explain the law, to advise on personal and business matters and to represent clients, to explain the law, to advise on personal and business matters and to represent clients before courts and government agencies. In order to qualify for admission to the bar in Missouri, an applicant must be a citizen of the United States and have completed the equivalent of at least six years of college training, the last three of them in an accredited law school. An applicant must display moral fitness to practice law, as determined by an investigation, and must successfully pass a rigorous examination in many fields of law given by the Missouri Board of Law Examiners, under the general supervision of the Supreme Court of Missouri. A lawyer admitted to practice becomes an officer of the court.
A Lawyer's Duties
A lawyer's first duty is to see that clients are given the benefit of all the legal rights they enjoy in connection with their problems. A lawyer is sworn to conduct cases and matters in an orderly manner and so that they may be decided upon their merits. A lawyer may not make any agreements or incur any obligations which might jeopardize a client's interests.
Services Lawyers Render
A lawyer can help whenever you have a problem or perform an act that involves the law. Any business transaction, every instrument you sign or agreement you make, any accident you have, or actions you take involving property, taxes, sales and countless other situations may require the advice of your lawyer. Your lawyer: can give you advice on your legal problems by telling you what to do or not to do; can prepare written instruments, such as contracts and deeds; may be able to settle disputes for you out of court with a saving of trouble and expense; can represent you in the civil courts where disputes over property, money, damages and family relationships are determined; and can render innumerable other services because of training and experience in the law.
When to Go to a Lawyer
The best time is before, not after, you are in some legal trouble. Just as your doctor can better help you if given a chance to practice preventive medicine, so your lawyer can save you both money and difficulties if you consult your lawyer when any legal change in your position is planned.
How Lawyers Charge for Services
A lawyer generally makes only a nominal charge, if any, for a first visit. Only when actual time is spent in working on a case is there a charge. When a monetary settlement is involved, the charge may be on a percentage basis. More often, your lawyer charges for actual time spent on such details as assembling facts and looking up the many possible laws affecting the case. When a lawyer charges for "advice," this does not mean an offhand personal opinion. A lawyer's advice is a conclusion reached after perhaps hours or days combing through volumes of law to exhaust all the authorities and find all the law affecting your problem. (See What You Should Know About Lawyers' Fees, a separate Missouri Bar brochure.)
A Lawyer's Duty to You in Civil Cases
A lawyer's whole career depends upon unswerving loyalty to clients. A lawyer may, however, see weakness in a particular case and may know that a court fight will be both expensive and probably futile for a client. In such a case, a lawyer may advise the client to bargain or, with the client's permission, may bargain for the client. It has, with truth, been said that a settlement, even though for an amount less than claimed, may be far better than an expensive, lengthy lawsuit, the result of which is uncertain. Litigation can be a luxury. Lawyers recognize this and pursue conciliation and settlement wherever possible and advisable.
A Lawyer's Duty to You in Criminal Cases
It is one of the glories of America that every person is considered innocent until proven guilty. Therefore, every defendant in a criminal case has a right to all the protection which the law gives to an innocent person. It is the duty of an accused person's lawyer to see that a client has the benefit of all rights under the Constitution of the United States and of the state, the laws passed by the duly elected legislative bodies and the decisions announced by the courts over centuries of human experience. A lawyer must see that the client receives a fair trial and is tried for the alleged crime only on the basis of competent evidence, properly produced. The mere fact that a client's case is an unpopular one even to the extent of being notorious should not lessen the vigor with which a lawyer defends the client.
A Lawyer's Knowledge of the Rules of Evidence
Trials are conducted under rules of evidence which have been developed over the centuries to produce fair trials. Witnesses often attempt to make statements regarding facts of which they do not have personal knowledge. Such testimony is called hearsay evidence. If it were allowed to become a part of the records of the trial, the result might be injustice. Rules of evidence, therefore, prohibit a witness from telling what someone else, who is not present in court, told him. Similarly, testimony regarding a conversation with a person who is dead at the time of the trial may be ruled out because there is no one who can prove that the testimony is true or false. A lawyer protects the client by seeing, in court, that the rules of evidence are followed and enforced. Likewise, only lawyers can properly advise clients as to their rights and effectively represent them in a host of matters involving business, personal, tax and other problems, because of their knowledge of evidence and its use.
Your Duty to Your Lawyer
You should give your lawyer all of the facts concerning the case or other matter and make a full and fair disclosure of the entire situation. Your lawyer needs all the facts because the application of the law may vary with each fact and circumstance concerning a case. The relationship between lawyer and client is confidential, and any confidential information that a client gives a lawyer, even the confession of a crime, is considered privileged, and the lawyer cannot divulge it without the client's consent. A lawyer, furthermore, cannot represent both sides unless with their full knowledge and consent.
Preventive Law
A person too often thinks of his lawyer as a "last resort," to be consulted only when a dispute seems likely to result in litigation. Many disputes could be avoided, at small cost to the client, by agreements and contracts correctly and properly drawn in the first place. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure in the courts. As a service to the public, The Missouri Bar has undertaken a program designed to point out, through brochures and other means, some of the situations where "preventive" law will help people avoid trouble and loss.
Bar Associations
All persons, including judges, entitled to practice law in Missouri are members of The Missouri Bar. The Missouri Bar was created by rule of the Supreme court of Missouri to the end that its members "strive at all times to uphold the honor and maintain the dignity of the profession and to improve not only the law but the administration of justice." In addition, there are local bar associations of lawyers in your city or county. These are voluntary organizations of lawyers and judges and have the same purposes as The Missouri Bar, with comparable activities and committees working on the local level for the improvement of the law and for the public welfare.
Legal Ethics
The legal profession maintains a high standard of professional conduct based on the concept that loyalty to the client is a lawyer's first duty. Committees of the bar are working quietly but effectively to maintain these public service standards. The Supreme Court of Missouri may disbar, suspend or censure a lawyer for unprofessional conduct or for acts involving moral turpitude. Honesty, fair play and loyalty to clients are emphasized in the law school training all lawyers must have.
Unauthorized Practice
Unauthorized practice is the rendering of legal service or advice by a person not admitted by the Supreme Court to the practice of law. Lawyers object to the unauthorized practice of law, not because of self-interest (for frequently they could make higher fees in correcting the work done by untrained, unauthorized persons), but because lawyers know that the rendering of legal service or advice by such persons constitutes a real danger to members of the public. Lawyers know that while a non-lawyer may have some knowledge about one phase of the law, in any given instance the facts may make applicable other laws of which the non-lawyer is ignorant. It is far safer for the public to rely on an expert in any field of endeavor, be it law, medicine or any other professional field.
Why People Choose the Legal Profession
Lawyers enter the profession because they are drawn by their temperaments into work which calls for patient study and the ability to reason and analyze. Prospective law students are warned against taking up law to get rich. A lawyer sells time, knowledge and advice. It is an honorable, ancient profession and the change to be of service to the public is indeed an attraction to young people.
For Legal Advice, See Your Lawyer
If you need help finding a lawyer, call The Missouri Bar Lawyer Referral Service at 573/636-3635.
In St. Louis call
314/621-6681
In Kansas City call
816/221-9472
In Greene County call
417/831-2783